The Milford Bay fire department will have to scale back its plans for a new boathouse, after its request to spend more than $12,000 on a boat lift was blasted as “absurd” by some members of council.

The request, which came from township fire chief Jim Sawkins, aims to retrofit the department’s boathouse in Milford Bay to accommodate the new fire boat. The $78,000 boat was purchased last fall and is too large for the boathouse facility.

Council agreed earlier this year to invite bids for the boathouse’s repair. The work will add additional height and length to the structure.

During a council meeting last Tuesday, however, councillors heard the upgrades could cost upwards of $70,000.

According to Duncan Ross, the architect overseeing the project, the lowest bid for the work was $49,900. However, because of a mistake in the project drawings, workers would have to add an additional $10,700 onto the cost of the work. Architects and contingency fees would push the cost up by another $9,000.

The expenses did not sit well with some councillors, who said they never consented to repairing the boathouse in the first place.

“I’m really upset,” said councillor Brian Hare. Hare questioned why the boathouse needs a lift installed, something that represents about $12,000 of the project’s cost.

“I think the lift idea is totally absurd,” he said. “We’ve got a boathouse here that we didn’t even know we had to renovate and now it just seems to be going from bad to worse.”

Councillor Ian Wallace pointed out that if a power failure occurs, the lift may prevent firefighters from accessing the boat.

Councillor Stewart Martin, meanwhile, said the proposed boathouse would not even abide by the township’s bylaws. The building’s 18-foot height is two feet taller than permitted.

Like Hare, both Wallace and Martin said they, too, disagreed with the spending.

“I don’t really understand the need for a hoist,” said Wallace.

Sawkins, in response, said approximately $50,000 could be deducted from the costs due to the sale of old fire equipment. The township could use $25,000 from the sale of its old fire trucks, as well as $15,000 from the sale of the Milford Bay station’s old fireboat for the boathouse repairs. Firefighters have also committed to donate an additional $8,000 to the project if the boat lift is included, he indicated.

The lift would allow firefighters to access the boat into the winter season, if there is no ice in the water.

Still, some councillors could not be sold on the project, and said the fireboat could be stored off-site during the winter.

Council eventually voted to reject Ross’s recommended bid.

Mayor Susan Pryke, however, worried that Milford Bay firefighters would be left without any boathouse if council did not rethink the matter.

“What are they supposed to do now?” Pryke asked council. She suggested suspending the rules of procedure to discuss the project further.

In the end, council agreed to eliminate the boat lift and have the fireboat stored off-site during the winter, reducing the project’s costs to $47,600. After revenues from the fire trucks and old fire boat, the impact to the 2008 capital budget will be just $6,435.

The matter will be debated further at budget time, said Pryke.

“It doesn’t mean you’ve got it,” Pryke said to Sawkins, “but at least the budget can be prepared with some sort of figure in it.”

Over the last two years, Muskoka Lakes council has spent more than $6 million on the township’s fire department. Five new fire trucks were acquired last year, while new fire stations in Port Carling and Walker’s Point are in the works.

Most recently, council approved an approximate $700,000 expenditure to replace the department’s entire stock of self-contained breathing apparatuses (SCBAs), the respiratory devices used to help firefighters breathe while working around smoke or other harmful inhalants.